Okay, so Valve have finally lifted the curtain on a lot of what the New Bloom Festival patch for Dota 2 will include. Other than a new hero (yay) and a load of new patch notes that drastically change a few things around (…yay?), we’re also getting a brand new mode which is kinda similar to one that people may have been playing with unauthorised mods. Cough.

The new hero is Terrorblade, a demon-y chap with four brand-spanking new abilities. Reflection lets him create a double of a foe, which attacks its original and slows their movement. Conjure Image creates an illusion of Terrorblade, which helps him in battle. Metamorphosis grants Terrorblade bonus damage and changes his attack to ranged. Finally, Sunder lets him swap his health with that of another player – enemy or ally. As with Legion Commander, he’ll also be getting an Arcana item that changes his animations, his voice, his skin and model, the death effect of his victims, his spell effects and icons, and comes with a gem that tints him and his abilities. Hurray!

The new game mode, unlocked at level 11, is Random Ability Draft. This assigns each player a random hero and then shoves all of their abilities into a pool, with players taking turns to pick which abilities their hero will get. To quote the page: “Behold the majesty of a Pouncing Pudge, witness Axe fumbling with Psi Blades, and experience the terror of Illusory Orb Magnus.” So… yeah. That’s going to be fantastic.

Then there’s the patch notes, which are going to cause a storm of controversy. Earth Spirit has (thankfully) been nerfed, although I suspect he’ll still be pretty terrifying. Broodmother has been massively nerfed following the ridiculous abilities granted in the previous patch – she can no longer leave map boundaries, Spin Web no longer gives vision, and she loses free pathing if enemies can see her. Drow Ranger’s silence is no longer a targeted AoE, instead firing out of her as a wave and causing knockback. Bottle and Shadow Amulet can now be used on other players. Necrobook creeps are less powerful. Blink Dagger no longer has a manacost.

What else? Ooh, lots of stuff. Lion’s Aghs upgrade now causes Finger of Death to also affect units within a 200 AOE range of the target, which should allow for some horrifying damage when combined with Magnus or Enigma. Speaking of Enigma, Black Hole now has a wider AoE and a longer cast range. Sniper’s range has now been dramatically increased with Take Aim. Tinker now has an Aghs upgrade, which doubles the missile count and the Laser cast range (marking the first time I’m aware of that an Aghs upgrade doesn’t affect the ultimate). Faceless Void now gets 1000 movement speed and phase within his Chronosphere, meaning it’s much harder for him to accidentally fuck himself with it.

Look, there are shitloads of tweaks and changes, and some of them are pretty big. I mean, I don’t think I even mentioned the fact that you lose gold every second if you don’t pick a hero before the All Pick timer runs out, or that Roshan is now bigger and meaner and now continues to get bigger and meaner after 45 minutes. The full patch notes for Dota 2 6.80 are below, but you may also want to check them out on the official page – anything annotated with a [?] mark has more detail, only discoverable on mouseover.

I’m curious as to whether this is everything, or if we’ll maybe see a little more. I suspect it’s the former, but… Terrorblade? Hmm.

GENERAL

You now lose one gold per second if you haven’t picked a hero after the selection timer runs out in All Pick

All Pick selection time increased from 60 to 75

All Pick pre-creep time reduced from 90 to 75

Roshan no longer stops upgrading his hp/damage/armor at 45 minutes

Roshan upgrade rate increased by 20%

Roshan bounty rescaled from 105-600 to 150-400

HEROES

Alchemist Night vision reduced from 1400 to 800 Unstable Concoction maximum shaking duration reduced from 7 to 5.5 [?] Unstable Concoction no longer continues to get stronger while it is in the air

Death Prophet Exorcism cooldown increased from 100 to 115 Silence AoE increased from 350 to 425

Dragon Knight Dragon Tail cooldown rescaled from 9 to 12/11/10/9

Drow Ranger Reworked Silence [?]

Earth Spirit Stone Remnant recharge timer increased from 25 to 35 Geomagnetic Grip now does a 2/3/4/5 second silence instead of a 1/1.5/2/2.5 second stun Geomagnetic Grip damage rescaled from 125 to 100/150/200/250 Boulder Smash damage rescaled from 100/150/200/250 to 125 Boulder Smash now does a 0.75/1.25/1.75/2.25 second stun instead of a 3.5/4/4.5/5 second silence Boulder Smash radius from 225 to 200 Rolling Boulder now also gets interrupted if disabled during the initial 0.6 rolling charge, instead of only while its moving Geomagnetic Grip now kills trees along the path of a dragged allied hero Targeting someone directly with Boulder Smash will now be blocked by Linken’s Sphere Fixed being able to cast Geomagnetic Grip on magic immune allies Fixed Boulder Smash being able to target Magic Immune units Fixed Rolling Boulder travel distance going further than intended if you use a Stone Remnant near the end of the roll

Keeper of the Light Mana Leak stun duration increased from 1.3/1.6/1.9/2.2 to 1.5/2/2.5/3

Legion Commander Moment of Courage now only procs one extra lifesteal attack [?] Moment of Courage buff grace period increased from 0.5 to 1.0 seconds Moment of Courage cooldown reduced from 1.2 to 0.9